I know that 戯 (kyujitai 戲) is based on 戱, a historical variant. It’s just that 虚 means “empty, worthless, false” while 戯/戲 refers to happier things like theater and video games. Feels like saying that I like “emptiness, worthlessness” when writing that I like playing video games or watching Peking opera
1 comment
Looking at the origin of 戯 from [wikitionary](https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/戲#Chinese),
> Phono-semantic compound (形聲, OC *qʰral, *qʰrals, *qʰaː): phonetic 䖒 + semantic 戈 (“halberd”), originally referring to the wing or flank of an army.
So in this case the 虚 (originally 䖒) just provided the priginal Chinese pronounciation. Another example of 形声 characters like this is 珠 (pearls arent red)